Category Archives: Pre-fall Recipes

Using over-ripe bananas in baking goes way beyond standard loaf bread! These are not your typical dry and crumbly scones. They are a lot more moist, but just as dense as a typical scone. The insides are more light and fluffy and totally delicious! A lot of banana bread scone recipes call for a brown sugar glaze but to cut down on the sweetness I only topped the scones with cinnamon sugar and a dusting of powdered sugar. Which still sounds like a lot right? But it actually turned out being not overly sweet at all. If you have a bunch of over-ripe bananas languishing on your counter give these scones a try!Continue Reading →

This soup is perfect for rainy summer nights or chilly fall days. It combines roasted cauliflower, yellow squash, red potatoes with fresh fennel and thyme. You start off the soup by broiling the cauliflower until just charred. I used homemade chicken stock which lends the best flavor to the recipe. I couldn’t get enough of these flavors combined! The spicy sausage combined with the charred flavor from the cauliflower with the fresh herbs really took this soup to the next level. Serve this soup with some fresh parsley, grated parmesan cheese and a crusty baguette.Continue Reading →

Spring is around the corner but in many places winter is still raging. This soup is loaded with healthy veggies but is still hearty enough to combat the winter chills. For the stock I used my go to recipe for Homemade Stock. You can either use what you have pre-made or make it for the soup–either way works fine and instructions will follow. I packed this recipe with tons of veggies such as acorn squash, spinach, corn, peas, carrots and cabbage. The recipe is surprisingly hearty and flavorful. It has been one of my favorite go-to winter soup recipes over the past few weeks!Continue Reading →

I love soups and tex-mex food and this recipe combines the best of both worlds! This soup combines a delicious mix of green chilies and tomatillos, chorizo, hominy, potatoes and spices. I went a little overboard with the garnishes and topped the soup with crumbled queso fresco, green onion, fresh lime, cilantro and smokey baked croutons. Even the croutons alone in this recipe are stand out awesome and could easily be snacked on alone! The recipe does require a lot of ingredients and time to prepare but it is totally worth it in the end. I actually never made anything with hominy before and I thought it worked really nicely with the other ingredients. The soup was hardy, with multiple layers of sweet, spicy and savory flavors. I chose a beef chorizo for the meat but soy and pork varieties would work fine in this soup. All of the ingredients blended together so well and I was happy with how it came out!

To go with the batch of Veggie Dumplings, I wanted to make the perfect sauce to go with them. I read about Momos and how they are frequently paired with a tomato based sauce so I settled on a sweet and savory chutney. I loved the flavor of this sauce. The combination of spices and herbs with the acid from the lime and apple cider vinegar was so delicious. The best part was that it didn’t take long to make this and most of the ingredients I already had on hand. It made me want to double the recipe and just have it as a snack by itself!

I love little steamed dumplings with all their different types of fillings and sauces. These dumplings, also called ‘Momos,’ hail from Tibet and can have a wide variety of meat and veggie fillings. This recipe is vegetarian style with a mixture of beans, spices and tender veggies. The filling is seasoned with soy sauce, rice wine, garlic, and green chilies which help provide some heat. I chose a Chinese ‘Bao’ style dough for the wrapper which has a somewhat thicker consistency along with a little more sweetness. A word of warning, these dumplings are addictive and it was hard to stop eating them! Luckily, the recipe makes a lot of filling and enough for several days of Momos! The dumplings paired perfectly with the Tomato Chutney which was also out of this world.

This recipe is so perfect for rainy Spring days! Chicken noodle soup is one of my favorites and I love trying different versions of the classic. This soup is filled with veggies, vermicelli noodles and herbs. The fresh ingredients give the recipe a lighter effect which is great for the current season. The broth is simple and clean, seasoned with cilantro, parsley and lime juice. While I’m used to the thicker egg noodles in chicken noodle soup I really liked the thin vermicelli noodles too. You can make the soup easily with just 4 drumsticks but I chose to make the stock and soup out of the whole chicken. I like the mixture of white and dark meat in the soup; plus the whole bird flavors the stock nicely. I can see this becoming a regular meal on colder days!

Ever since I made Irish Soda Bread Cranberry Scones I have been thinking about making another batch with a twist. I loved the fluffy texture of the previous batch and I wanted to keep that going. I took the basic ingredients of the first recipe and added chocolate chips and orange zest. It was so easy with great results! The texture and consistency was just like before only with the added bonus of orange and chocolate. The orange zest and chocolate were balanced perfectly and it reminded me more of a dessert than a breakfast scone. These were a huge hit so I will definitely be making these again!

What better way to make a slow transition into fall than with an apple rhubarb crisp? I am a little reluctant to acknowledge the fact that fall is coming so it’s nice to bring the two seasons together in a dessert! I saw a lot of recipes for apple rhubarb crisp that called for green apples but I thought sweet red apples would be a good choice since rhubarb is so tart. To compensate on the apples’ sweetness I just cut the sugar a bit and it turned out great! The recipe is similar to the other rhubarb crisp recipe and just as delicious! I liked the combination of the sweet apples, tart rhubarb and crunchy crust. Whipped cream and vanilla ice cream are the perfect accompaniment for this dessert!

To go along my Ethiopian Lentil Curry I chose another Ethiopian-style curry with chickpeas and cauliflower. One of my favorite things about curry is that both of these dishes can be called a “curry” yet they are both so different and complimentary at the same time. This stew is a yellow curry seasoned with turmeric, cumin, cardamom, coriander and paprika. It is more loosely based on Ethiopian chickpea and vegetable stews because I thought it would be fun to embellish it a bit. I don’t think preserved lemons are found too much in Ethiopian food but they really added amazing flavor to this dish. The preparation was easy and the result was so tasty! It tasted great with the lentils as well as the Injera bread.